AVOIDING THE SUITS

Stories crammed with "official" soundbites often are dull to watch and difficult to understand. But they're fairly quick and easy to produce, so they keep turning up on the news. Beyond being boring, there's another drawback to these stories.

Viewers don't see them as relevant to their daily lives, even though the issue involved may affect them directly. One solution is to "avoid the suits" and let other voices tell the story. But how do you find those other voices?

NewsLab offers the following suggestions. If they help, please let us know.

Find a Focus, Fast

• Get a head start. If you're assigned to cover an event or a news conference, work the phones ahead of time to get details and begin planning.
  
  
• Ask what it all means and find out who will be affected. Those are the people you want to talk to for your story.
  
  
• Work fast and smart. If you have a cell phone, make calls while in transit. If you can't, ask for help. Enlist others at the station to help you find the right people to illustrate the story.
  
  
• Find a small story that illustrates the bigger picture. Tell that story, and put the "news" and background in the lead-in or tag, perhaps even broken out as a v/o-sot for the anchor.

Find New Voices

• At the news conference or event, look for people who are there because the issue affects them. They're often in the audience, not at the podium. If possible, arrange to talk with them in a more appropriate location.
  
  
• If a policy or issue affects a particular area, consider just going there. If it affects a particular type of person, consider where you might find them. Example: to find new parents, visit a baby superstore.
  
  
• Cultivate opinion leaders in diverse communities so they can be your tour guides when stories come up that affect those communities.

Seek Strong Elements

• Ask the right questions of the right people. Ask about their personal experience, not their reaction to the new policy. Example: have kids describe what they eat for lunch at school, rather than asking what they think about the new school lunch program.
  
  
• Get video of people who are affected by the issue or policy in a setting that will help illustrate their connection to the story, and that will also provide you with B-roll. Example: talk to former gang members in the neighborhood where they used to live.

Avoid the Obvious

• Don't do M-O-S interviews with people who know and care little about the story. They won't add anything worthwhile.
  
  
• If you go to a news conference, don't roll on much of it. That way, you won't be tempted use it.
  
  
• Don't feel obliged to do on camera interviews with officials. They're often better sources of information than soundbites. If you must do an on camera interview, be alert for jargon, acronyms or other stilted language. Ask questions again until you get an answer everyone can understand.